During the Yongzheng period of the Qing Dynasty, the emperor's confidant Ortai was appointed as the governor of Yunnan and Guizhou, and his task was not only to implement the policy of changing the land and returning it to the river, but also to have a more important mission - to fight abduction.
In the second year of the Yongzheng Dynasty, Gao Qizhuo, the then governor of Yunnan and Guizhou, reported to the emperor that the problem of human trafficking in the Yunnan-Guizhou-Sichuan region was very serious. Although Gao Qizhuo has taken some measures, there are still a large number of trafficking gangs hiding in the Yunnan-Guizhou Mountains, and the persistence of the problem of trafficking has also affected public order and the implementation of land reform and repatriation.
Ortai, who succeeded as the governor of Yunnan and Guizhou after Gao Qizhuo, further carried out the work of eliminating the trafficking gang in accordance with Yongzheng's instructions. He had to deal with a question that was old and old.
During the Qing Dynasty, the evil act of human trafficking harmed the world, and was listed as "sloppy and slightly sold people" by the "Great Qing Dynasty Statutes". This offence refers to the use of deception, coercion, or even plunder, to take good people for oneself or to sell them to others.
When Gao Qizhuo inspected the Yunnan-Guizhou-Sichuan border, where human traffickers frequently operated, he found that an "industrial chain" of human trafficking had been formed. Human traffickers and gangsters collude with each other to abduct and sell people for huge profits.
Gangsters are local gangs of gangsters who find targets for traffickers, abduct and loot victims, and then pick up traffickers to transport victims out of the province. They often hide in the mountains and forests, attacking lone passers-by or unsupervised children.
Traffickers buy the population from the hands of the gangsters and share the spoils on the ground, making a profit of a few taels to a dozen taels at a time, and then bringing the population into the economically developed Sichuan, Huguang, Jiangsu, Zhejiang and other places, changing hands layer by layer, and making a profit of more than 20 taels.
In the Qing Dynasty's Ba County Archives, the profits of a trafficker who abducted a woman or child were even several times higher than the salary of a long-term worker for three years.
Trafficking is rampant in Yunnan-Guizhou-Sichuan, mainly because of the low population of Yunnan-Guizhou Province. Gao Qizhuo said in his compromise: "Guizhou borders Sichuan, and the price of Sichuan people is quite expensive, and Sichuan traffickers (referring to abduction and trafficking gangs mainly from Sichuan) often instruct Guizhou local sticks, and the local sticks in turn hook up with the seedlings (referring to the local ethnic minorities in Guizhou) to bundle up and plunder the population and give and receive from each other. ”
In ancient times, the Yunnan-Guizhou Plateau was barren in the mountains, the people lived in poverty, and women were not good at needlework.
As a result, traffickers from various provinces have come to the remote mountainous areas of Yunnan and Guizhou to take advantage of and abduct people. When the traffickers transported the trafficked people out of the province, most of them went deep into the mountains and dense forests, lurking during the day and walking at night, and along the way there were boatmen who helped them cross the river and houses people who harbored the traffickers' feet, and it was difficult for officers and soldiers to catch them during patrols along the river.
Even if the traffickers are caught, the situation in the border areas of Yunnan, Guizhou, Sichuan, Guangzhou and other provinces is complicated, and the boundary sites are often unclear, and the local people often transfer responsibilities to each other, resulting in a lack of management.
These problems gave Gao Qizhuo, the governor of Yunnan and Guizhou, a headache. During the Kang Yongqian period, the evil practice of human trafficking was still spreading in many places, whether it was the junction of Yunnan, Guizhou, and Sichuan, where transportation was inconvenient and the economy was backward, or Jingshi, Jiangnan, Guangzhou, and other places where the economy was relatively prosperous, the business of human traffickers was thriving, and their methods were brutal and the harm was enormous.
Zhen Shiyin's daughter Zhen Yinglian was abducted at the age of one and sold to Feng Yuan, the son of Jinling, and then was favored and robbed by Xue Baochai's brother Xue Pan, and finally renamed Xiangling.
A tragic human trafficking drama that starts with "Yinglian was abducted". The abduction and trafficking of the Qing Dynasty was cruel beyond imagination. Human trafficker gangs commit crimes, not only abducting and trafficking people, but also committing murder, robbery, ** and other crimes.
There are even traffickers who disguise themselves as relatives and abduct young children. Trafficking is abhorrent and deeply feared. A misunderstanding caused by the "Zhang Yishang falsely accused Diao of abducting a woman" revealed the complexity of the abduction incident.
According to statistics, in the Qing Dynasty's Criminal Case Review, women and children were mainly trafficked, of which 86% were women. They often end up being sold into slavery, as spouses, or as prostitutes and prostitutes, depriving them of their freedom and dignity.
Even older women can be sold as workers. Human trafficking is a nightmare for victims.
Xu Yang's "Picture of the Prosperity of Gusu" depicts the evil of human trafficking hidden under the surface of prosperity and prosperity. Governor Gao Qizhuo was deeply worried about this, and in the fourth year of Yongzheng, he launched a large-scale campaign to "change the land and return to the stream" to strengthen his rule over the southwest region.
As the governor of Yunnan and Guizhou, Ortai took drastic measures to crack down on human trafficking gangs, believing that these gangs posed a threat to social order and stability, and might even incite Miao people to rebel.
He sent troops into the traffickers' settlements, captured hundreds of them, and severely punished the key culprits. Ortai also pointed out that many members of human trafficking gangs are from the bottom of society, and they take advantage of the hardship and helplessness of the people at the bottom to carry out acts that kill their conscience.
His crackdown has had some effect, but in the southwest region, the problem of human trafficking still exists, and it will take long-term governance and efforts to solve it.
In the Qing Dynasty, the people at the bottom were exploited, and the phenomenon of human trafficking was serious. Although the Qing Dynasty cracked down on illegal trafficking, it also acquiesced in the "legal" trade of some of the population.
The law divides the population into "good people" and "untouchables", and the untouchables include slaves, prostitutes, subordinates, etc., who can buy and sell normally. The population market is juxtaposed with the horse market, the cattle market, and the sheep market, and there is a "human market" outside the Shuncheng Gate in Beijing, which specializes in buying and selling slaves and maids, and slaves are prevalent in the mansions of princes and ministers.
The Qing Dynasty's permission to buy and sell untouchables provided an opportunity for traffickers to take advantage of it, leading to rampant trafficking and countless separations. The government's acquiescence and slackness in human trafficking have also made human traffickers gain momentum, and the phenomenon of abduction and trafficking has been repeatedly prohibited.
At the end of the Qing Dynasty, a woman carried two young children on her back and sold them on the street. In the thirteenth year of Yongzheng, the local people of Guizhou rebelled, and Ortai was demoted due to improper handling, but he was finally able to return to the court because of his meritorious service in governing the southwest.
However, the vices of human trafficking are still not being applied. After Yongzheng, trafficking gangs were active in the southwest region, and some traffickers even called the abducted people "tall donkeys" and sold them to Huguang, Jiangsu, Zhejiang and other places.
Although the Qing court promulgated a law prohibiting human trafficking in the second year of Xuantong, it did not stop all forms of human trafficking. Hopefully, there will be no more trafficking in the world.